Positively Diät

Another cold, harsh, awesome post-punk gem out of Iron Lung Records here through an East Berlin based act called Diät. Positive Energy is anything but - a plodding Total Control channelling Joy Division duality of rigidity and excess. Easy comparisons perhaps, but it is what it is. 'Young & Beautiful' is as dour working class gaze as you can get, while 'Toonie' is far more frenetic yet no less sullen and sour. They even cover The Cannanes of all bands with Blue Skies Over The Ocean, an indie gem given the black denim turned up against the cold punk treatment. This band is incredibly taut and tight, a fierce unit, but there is a drollness here that adds levity to their abrasive worldview - and it makes Positive Energy a fairly accurate moniker indeed. I'm really digging this. Buy Positive Energy here.

Wild Animals Live In The Flesh World

San Francisco BDSM squallers Flesh World are playing tonight at New River Studios in what is likely to be a sell out show. Why? Because The Wild Animals In My Life is a bloody good record from a bloody good band. Trading their more hardcore and C86 beginnings for a Gothic trajectory, phasing in shoegaze washes and glowing harmonies whilst keeping everything decidedly tense and decadent. You can hear the pop constructions squirming under the terseness in 'Here In The Dark'; the punk power punching out throughout 'Shaved Head'; the post-punk melancholy swirling like acrid thoughts peaking like jagged spikes in a comedown on 'Just To Tear Me Down'. 'Strawberry Bomber' and 'Your Love Is Like A House' get the closest to all-out surly punk. The common denominator her is power. It's held in check, but ever-present. Can't get enough of this. Grab The Wild Animals In My Life here (out through Iron Lung). Head down to their show tonight - with excellent support from Good Throb, The Lowest Form and Border, it promises to be a good one.

Total System Shutdown Is Typically Out Of Control

Bosses in the ‘80s had it easy; powder blue suits, cigars, Huey Lewis, helicopters and shit. Total fucking self-obsessed bliss: lines, all highs, no looking down, lines, synthesisers, lines, keeping track of how much of the world they just wrote off for cash, lines. None of them would have had a chance on the Voight-Kampff machine.

It’s not so easy now. But that’s made things worse in a way – it’s harder to spot the string they pull you along with. The nooses aren’t as obvious. The ties are neutral colours. They’ll make you think it was your decision. Yeah, you really wanted to go in on Saturday, didn’t you?

I sat through an hour of it yesterday. Words, words, words, graphs, words… Pale faces in PowerPoint headlights, worrying about their superannuation like there’s no other way. I should really go in on Saturday, shouldn’t I? ‘Yeah, you should,’ your boss says without saying it. “Mate” he says, clammy hand on your shoulder, ‘how’re the kids and the home loan?’ The threat slides right past the Voight-Kampff.

Remember that they’re always the same. Don’t buy into it. Buy into Total Control because they know and they use all of it against them. Here is your realisation. Don’t go in on Saturday. Listen to Total Control instead.

Buy the excellent Typical System here (it's still pre-order due to a shutdown at the pressing plant - which has waylaid the fourth Sonic Masala Records release, Cobwebbs' WORLDWIDEWEBBS) - it's out now through Iron Lung Records.